Silver Arrows
Banned
2004 definitely has one of the most stacked years ever in gaming. Not only did the twin-headed Hydra of instant classics, those being MGS 3 and GTA San Andreas, release in this holiday season, many others came out. Racing games, meanwhile, had a double billing of titles from EA that were apart of this stacked lineup, those being Burnout 3 Takedown and NFS Underground 2. Today, I'm going to talk about NFSU2.
First off, lets talk about the Toyota AE86 Corolla present within this game.
These are it's stock stats.
And this is what it can do, well upgraded. (I apologize for the shitty video, but it gets the point across)
This car is hilariously overpowered. Even at the beginning of the game, bone stock, this car runs circles around anything else. It's mix of deadly acceleration (Made even faster with upgrades later on and half-decent tuning) and rock solid handling make it the most over-powered thing in the existence of gaming. Even at Hard, it makes the game a joke.
Aside from this, the actual game feels...weird. NFSU2 came at a time when everybody and their mother was making their games free-roam, as GTA clones in all sorts of genres became semi-viable. Unlike many other games which feel like the open world is forced, U2 uses it's small city (At least for the time, especially compared to San Andreas which came out a mere month afterwards) to the utmost advantage. The developers have hidden tons of collectibles in the nooks and crannies of the city, alongside hidden races which give you a reason to listen to the various phone calls outlining new events which are present in the districts. The game often gives you a vague description of where these events are, and the reward for completing them is often an increased cash payout, and more respect. Though you don't need to do them, which is nice. The game also really makes you go up and down the map when it comes to magazine and DVD cover opportunities, alongside different unique part opportunities placed in the different shops on the map.
The actual racing, however, doesn't really feel exciting. And playing it now, I don't know why. It doesn't have the bombastic nature of the races placed within Most Wanted, where cops would be swirling around you, and none of the classic arcade thrills present in the original Underground. It exists in it's own vacuum. And that's not exactly a good thing. It feels a bit too...sanitized. Devoid of entertainment. That may be due to me using the most overpowered car in the game, but even driving in other cars, it doesn't feel right.
The game also has a really weird progression system. Essentially, it's tied into the game's customization system: the more extravagant shit you slap onto the car, the more your car rating will be raised. It works on a ten star scale, and as you unlock more parts, you're supposed to add them. Unique body parts add onto this, but the thing that's weird about this is that aside from this, the game really doesn't tell you that you need to get these parts in order to advance. As a result, you could be doing races and wondering why there is no progression happening, and because the parts you need to advance and gain magazine covers and the like is tied into winning race, you'll get stuck in a rut and not know what to do. It feels a little bit worse the NFS Undercover's asinine leveling system.
The customization system was heavily lauded at launch, and many people wanted it to return in some form. While it has, at least from the small snippets that NFS 2015 has shown us...I'm not so hot on it. Because the customization system ties so much into the leveling system, it basically forces you to put ugly, garish looking vinyls and mods onto your car, meaning for people like me who want a generally clean, inoffensive car, it basically means no leveling for you if you wish. As such, it really soured me on such customization systems, and makes me even gladder that Most Wanted abandoned such a system.
While some people say that U2 was the last good NFS game (Which I disagree with wholeheartedly, but that's for another day) I think that while it has a nice way of using it's small free roam environment and stretch it out for a 15 hour game, everything else feels like it's in flux, either trying to work off of what was in the original Underground, and not succeeding particularly well, or ideas that simply wouldn't work until Most Wanted came around.
First off, lets talk about the Toyota AE86 Corolla present within this game.
These are it's stock stats.
And this is what it can do, well upgraded. (I apologize for the shitty video, but it gets the point across)
This car is hilariously overpowered. Even at the beginning of the game, bone stock, this car runs circles around anything else. It's mix of deadly acceleration (Made even faster with upgrades later on and half-decent tuning) and rock solid handling make it the most over-powered thing in the existence of gaming. Even at Hard, it makes the game a joke.
Aside from this, the actual game feels...weird. NFSU2 came at a time when everybody and their mother was making their games free-roam, as GTA clones in all sorts of genres became semi-viable. Unlike many other games which feel like the open world is forced, U2 uses it's small city (At least for the time, especially compared to San Andreas which came out a mere month afterwards) to the utmost advantage. The developers have hidden tons of collectibles in the nooks and crannies of the city, alongside hidden races which give you a reason to listen to the various phone calls outlining new events which are present in the districts. The game often gives you a vague description of where these events are, and the reward for completing them is often an increased cash payout, and more respect. Though you don't need to do them, which is nice. The game also really makes you go up and down the map when it comes to magazine and DVD cover opportunities, alongside different unique part opportunities placed in the different shops on the map.
The actual racing, however, doesn't really feel exciting. And playing it now, I don't know why. It doesn't have the bombastic nature of the races placed within Most Wanted, where cops would be swirling around you, and none of the classic arcade thrills present in the original Underground. It exists in it's own vacuum. And that's not exactly a good thing. It feels a bit too...sanitized. Devoid of entertainment. That may be due to me using the most overpowered car in the game, but even driving in other cars, it doesn't feel right.
The game also has a really weird progression system. Essentially, it's tied into the game's customization system: the more extravagant shit you slap onto the car, the more your car rating will be raised. It works on a ten star scale, and as you unlock more parts, you're supposed to add them. Unique body parts add onto this, but the thing that's weird about this is that aside from this, the game really doesn't tell you that you need to get these parts in order to advance. As a result, you could be doing races and wondering why there is no progression happening, and because the parts you need to advance and gain magazine covers and the like is tied into winning race, you'll get stuck in a rut and not know what to do. It feels a little bit worse the NFS Undercover's asinine leveling system.
The customization system was heavily lauded at launch, and many people wanted it to return in some form. While it has, at least from the small snippets that NFS 2015 has shown us...I'm not so hot on it. Because the customization system ties so much into the leveling system, it basically forces you to put ugly, garish looking vinyls and mods onto your car, meaning for people like me who want a generally clean, inoffensive car, it basically means no leveling for you if you wish. As such, it really soured me on such customization systems, and makes me even gladder that Most Wanted abandoned such a system.
While some people say that U2 was the last good NFS game (Which I disagree with wholeheartedly, but that's for another day) I think that while it has a nice way of using it's small free roam environment and stretch it out for a 15 hour game, everything else feels like it's in flux, either trying to work off of what was in the original Underground, and not succeeding particularly well, or ideas that simply wouldn't work until Most Wanted came around.